Thursday, July 12, 2012

Obama spending $30M on struggling schools - in Arab kingdom

The
Obama administration’s solution to public school budget cuts and
classroom overcrowding? Infuse millions of extra federal dollars into
constructing modern facilities and renovating old ones, while deploying
additional computer equipment – and new furniture – in schools
nationwide

Nationwide, that is, in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan.

A generous multinational political donor – one that straddles the
partisan fence, showering both parties with millions – secured the
contract for the latest phase of the project.

Though the company’s entry into the initiative is recent, this
particular U.S. effort in modernizing the Jordanian school system had
begun under President George W. Bush. The administration had scheduled
the attainment of some program objectives beyond Bush’s second term in
office.

The White House under Barack Obama, however, has stepped up the
program, offering greater financial resources to the Middle Eastern
nation in order to bring those plans to fruition. USAID continues those
prior engineering and design efforts, linking them to the latest
planning, construction and technological/material support initiatives.

MWH has combined its political and financial influence through a
political action committee jointly operated with corporate affiliate
mCapitol Management, whose president, Gary J. LaPaille, once was
Illinois Democratic Party chairman and vice-chairman of the Democratic
National Committee.

LaPaille has publicly acknowledged that the Obama-Illinois connection
has benefited his firm, a consequence, according to The Hill newspaper,
of Obama’s “aggressive legislative agenda.”

“It doesn’t hurt to be someone who is from Chicago or Illinois,” LaPaille in 2009 was quoted telling The Hill. “I don’t market it like that, but there aren’t that many of us out there.”

The mCapitol Management/MWH Americas PAC over the past 15 years has
bestowed direct financial support upon Republicans and Democrats alike.
Similarly, the PAC’s donations to other committees have helped fill the
coffers of groups and individuals spanning the liberal-conservative
spectrum.

For example, the mCapitol/MWH PAC gave $110,250 to the Democratic
Senatorial Campaign Committee between 1997 and 2011, according to
Federal Election Commission records. On a similar scale, the PAC donated
$51,000 to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and $49,000
to DNC Services Corporation/Democratic National Committee around that
same period.

Just two donations to then-Sen. Obama, D-Ill., are on record, a pair
of $5,000 checks in 2004 cut to the future president on May 19 and Sept.
20, respectively. However, the Obama Senate campaign on Oct. 11 of that
year returned one of those checks to the mCapitol/MWH PAC for reasons
unstated in the FEC filing.

The National Republican Senatorial Committee has received nearly as
much as its Democratic counterpart committee from the PAC, but in less
time, gaining $110,000 from 2004-2011. The National Republican
Congressional Committee likewise got $110,000.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., got $20,000 from
1998-2011. House Speaker John Boehner received a little more than half
that amount – $11,000 – in about half the time (2006-2011).

In the most recent quarter of the 2010-2011 election cycle, the PAC’s bipartisan beneficence was equally reflected.

For instance, Sen. Debbie Stabenow, D-Mich., – whom the National
Organization for Women once unsuccessfully endorsed to become Obama’s
Secretary of Health and Human Services – received $2,500 from
mCapitol/MWH.

The campaign contribution came in along a flurry of other donations
from multiple sources to Stabenow, whose counterattack of former
Michigan Republican Rep. Pete Hoekstra reportedly led to record-breaking
fundraising numbers for the incumbent senator.

Hoekstra had come under fire from liberal groups for airing a Super
Bowl ad featuring an Asian actress with a fake but mild accent, who
thanked Debbie “Spend-It-Now” for contributing to the flight of jobs and
capital to China.

Conservative Filipino-American columnist Michelle Malkin
described that reaction as the “latest overwrought tempest” in a
political-correctness teapot. “Is the ad less than tasteful? Yes,”
Malkin wrote on her blog. “Is it ‘xenophobic’ to point out that China is
benefiting ginormously [sic] from our fiscal recklessness,
indebtedness, and outsourcing of jobs? Certainly not.”

The PAC that same quarter gave $10,000 to the Democratic Governors
Association, then turned around and gave $15,000 to the Republican
National Committee.

Transfers from mCapitol/MWH to others PACs – and the subsequent
financial support those secondary sources provided – again straddled the
partisan fence.

MWH, for example, directly gave Hillary Clinton $21,000 in
contributions prior to her becoming Secretary of State, while both
before and after that appointment MWH gave $26,000 to the Searchlight
Leadership Fund (2004-2011).

Searchlight, in turn, also gave Clinton a total of $21,000 between
her 1998 senatorial campaign and her 2008 bid for the presidential
nomination. Searchlight also separately doled out hundreds of thousands
of dollars in total donations to numerous other liberal icons including
Rep. Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis., – the House’s first openly lesbian
representative – and Rep. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., the House socialist.

Conversely, the mCapitol/MWH PAC donated $15,000 to the Republican
Mainstreet Partnership PAC (2006-2012), which in turn gave $28,500 to
the Republican National Committee (2009-2011).

MWH now will carry out the Jordan School Construction and
Rehabilitation Program II. Under JSP II, the company will provide
additional engineering and design functions as well as construction
services.

The Jordan MOE consequently will gain 25 new schools while having 100 other educational facilities improved.

In addition to satisfying the U.S. policy objective of reducing
overcrowding in Jordanian schools, MWH likewise will factor into its
design plans modern environmental standards.

Those “green” issues include those involving appropriate acoustic
standards, optimal light conditions, climate features such as
ventilation and solar radiation, and even color – from both an
environmental/psychological and maintenance point of view, according to
Request for Proposals in JSP II.

JSP I will provide technology and furniture to Jordan. MWH is not involved in that procurement.

Fast and Furious is not a D.C. law firm

Most Americans don’t care about whether Attorney General Eric
Holder is hiding Fast and Furious documents, because they don’t
understand the story.

Until someone can tell us otherwise, there is only one explanation
for why President Obama’s Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and
Explosives gave thousands of guns to Mexican drug dealers: It put guns
in their hands to strengthen liberals’ argument for gun control.

Precisely because this is such a jaw-dropping accusation –
criminality at the highest level of government to score a political
point – Republicans refuse to make it.

But the problem with Republican rectitude in discussing this scandal
is that as soon as they start talking about subpoenas and dates and
documents, TV channels change across America. They’re never going to get
answers unless they first explain to the American people why it
matters.

Liberals have been dying to reinstate the so-called “assault weapons”
ban, but they haven’t been able to for political reasons. (For more
information on this, see the 1994 congressional elections.)

A typically idiotic Democratic scheme, the “assault weapons” ban
prohibited the sale of semiautomatics that are operationally
indistinguishable from deer rifles, but which looked scary to liberal
women.

First, the Democrats tried lying about how American guns were being
found in the hands of Mexican drug dealers – while demanding a renewal
of the assault weapons ban.

Obama had barely unpacked at the White House when he and high-level
administration officials and Senate Democrats – Holder, Secretary of
State Hillary Clinton, Sen. Dianne Feinstein, Sen. Chuck Schumer –
started railing about how our lax gun control laws were putting guns in
the hands of Mexican drug cartels.

In 2010, even Mexico’s President Felipe Calderon demanded that the
U.S. reinstate the assault weapons ban – on the grounds that Mexican
drug violence was directly linked to the law’s repeal.

The claim was preposterous for many reasons, including the fact that
the type and quantity of armaments being used by Mexican drug cartels
can be obtained only from places such as North Korea, China, Russia,
Venezuela and Guatemala.

The notion that most guns used by Mexican drug gangs came from the
U.S. was a lie – exposed on about 1 million gun blogs and on Fox News.

So, then the Obama administration did exactly what Democrats had been
falsely accusing American gun sellers of doing: They put American guns
in the hands of Mexican drug cartels.

The only explanation for Fast and Furious is that it was a program to
prop up a losing gun control argument. The Waco and Ruby Ridge raids
were monstrous, but they at least made sense as simple screw-ups: 1)
ATF’s budget was about to be cut and it needed some showy raids; and 2)
law-enforcement officials detest private gun ownership on principle.

There is no conceivable law-enforcement objective to giving Mexican
drug dealers thousands of untrackable guns. It’s not even fun for the
agents, like an armed raid on a private home. If there’s some other
explanation, Holder isn’t telling.

Republicans refuse to state this clearly because they can’t prove it.
Instead, they just keep chattering about the documents that haven’t
been turned over and subpoenas that haven’t been answered.

Did Democrats wait for a smoking gun to accuse Karl Rove of treason
for revealing Valerie Plame’s identity as a CIA agent? It turned out
Rove didn’t reveal it, and it wouldn’t have been a crime if he had.

Did they wait for proof to accuse Sen. John McCain of committing
adultery? They had none, and yet that story ran on the front page of the
New York Times.

Did they have any evidence before accusing the entire Republican
House leadership of complicity in Mark Foley’s creepy emails to young
male interns? See if you can guess. Take all the time you need. Feel
free to call one of your “lifelines” if necessary.

If conservatives were our only source of information about 9/11, no
one would care about that, either. Somehow they’d make it about Osama
bin Laden not answering a subpoena.

This isn’t just another government program gone bad – a $300 ashtray, stimulus money fraud, Solyndra or Van Jones.

It isn’t just a story about some government official refusing to testify.

It isn’t even a story about an American dying as a result of a
government program, as outrageous as that is.

Yes, Brian Terry died at
the hands of a Mexican using a Holder-provided American gun. Pat Tillman
died.

Ron Brown died. People sometimes die as a result of government
screw-ups. Fast and Furious is worse.

Innocent people dying was the objective of Fast and Furious, not collateral damage.

It would be as if the Bush administration had implemented a covert
operation to dump a dangerous abortifacient in Planned Parenthood
clinics, resulting in hundreds of women dying – just to give pro-lifers
an argument about how dangerous abortion clinics are.

Chief Justice John Roberts’ gamble has been put into play as John Boehner held to his promise to repeal ObamaCare in the House. And kudos must go out to the five Democrats (Reps Dan Boren. (Okla.), Larry Kissell (N.C.), Jim Matheson (Utah), Mike McIntyre (N.C.), Mike Ross (Ark.) who voted with the Republicans for the House repeal.

These five men had the courage to cross party lines and do the right thing for their constituents by siding with Republicans in the final vote. In fact, these five Democrats opposed the law when it passed in 2010, knowing even back then that they didn’t need to pass the bill to find out just how bad it was, play on words intended.

With a final tally of 244 yeas for repeal (all Republicans plus the 5 crossover Democrats) and 185 voting nay (all Democrats), a loud and clear message has been sent to Barack Hussein Obama...’We the People’ don’t want your stinking ObamaTAX, my new name for ObamaCare, because ObamaCare is the mother of all TAXES!

And now ObamaTAX moves on to the Senate...hopefully that is, because Prince Harry has vowed not to let it get to the floor. Why...because it very well just might get repealed there too. With the Senate having 51 Democrats, 47 Republicans and 2 Independents, we only need 4 Senators to cross over and vote with the Republicans to repeal this monstrosity.

And this scares Prince Harry big time! Only 4 crossovers are needed and then it’s strike two for ObamaTAX.

While right now the House repeal is basically just symbolic, it does verify that this abomination was indeed a TAX as ruled by the Supreme Court. And even though Obama and the Democrats believe it will never pass the Senate, they seem to have forgotten about the legislative process known as ‘reconciliation’ that enables a simple 51 member majority to pass the repeal instead of the usual 60 votes needed to repeal a bill. And they forget this because they still refuse to accept the fact that ObamaCare is really ObamaTAX, and reconciliation is allowed to be used in matters relating to taxes.

And here is something Prince Harry surely will NOT like, our Constitution in Article 1 also states “the Yeas and Nays of the Members of either House on any question shall, at the Desire of one fifth of those present, be entered on the Journal.”

Simply, this means that while a yea/nay vote is not an accepted final vote it does let any Senator who has been recognized for discussion on any issue to “ask for the yeas and nays” on whatever question the Senate is considering that said Senator might have just presented. And if the yeas and nays are ordered at the request of at least 11 Senators (one-fifth of the minimum quorum of 51), that determines the manner in which a vote will be taken and again it would go back to reconciliation. And if any Senator happened to object to a “yeah and nay” roll call then a formal vote ensues but either way a vote is taken.

Can you imagine the uproar across the country if Prince Harry tried to prevent discussion or a floor vote on something the House passed and the majority of Americans don’t want...in a nutshell, Prince Harry Reid’s political career would be over, which in and of itself might not be such a bad idea.

But the bottom line is that today’s House vote proved that finally our representatives have started to listen to the voice of ‘We the People.’ ‘We the People’ don't want ObamaTAX because it's actually 21 new TAXES, it increases healthcare costs, hinders job creation, it forces us to buy something we might NOT want to buy, and penalizes us if we don’t. Also remember, if the House knew two years ago that Obama’s pet project would raise taxes, it would have failed to pass when it first came up for vote.

And an added bonus to today’s vote is that it gives Mitt Romney one hell of a talking point. With the vote proving ObamaCare is really ObamaTAX, Obama has broken his promise NOT to raise taxes on middle-class Americans. Remember what happened to Bush 41 when he said, “Read my lips...” well Barack Hussein Obama promised exactly the same thing and also broke his promise. Hopefully, his fate is sealed with that one.

So, now the Senate is up at bat, and it’s their turn to heed the voice of ‘We the People’ for if they don’t they too will be voted out come November.

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I am an American Patriot...part of the grassroots movement of bloggers spreading the truth the media will not. I am also co-host with Craig Andresen of RIGHT SIDE PATRIOTS on RSP Radio at: https://streamingv2.shoutcast.com/right-side-patriots